ABSTRACT
Simone Weil's philosophical perspective was profoundly transformed by the unexpected religious turn that occurred in her late twenties. For Weil, truth trumps life. Life is a lie; only death is true. The natural joy experienced in life is beautiful, a grace to be loved and relished with religious awe, as God the creator is the giver of every such natural joy. Weil employs the analogy of a cow reaching the end of her tether – suddenly brought to her knees: "End of using my energy". On these grounds Weil rejected Henri Bergson's notion of elan vital, the energy of organic life, as a philosophical or spiritual basis on which to rely for meaning. Weil believed that a sense of beauty, however mutilated and distorted by the alienations and predations of modern life, remains rooted in the human heart as the most powerful incentive toward justice, faith, hope, and love.
